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What is time, really? When we sleep and go into that dark corridor of unawareness, that lapse of consciousness that we can’t account for, it’s that place that we equate with tomorrow.

Today is here, and to dream of yesterday only brings us a moment closer to death. Time is just a stamp—nothing more, nothing less; because we can’t measure it, even with clocks, even with the appointments that we must keep; because we are forever going in and out of reality just by our constant daydreaming. Our memories serve us well. They allow us to travel back to those places where we messed up, where we fought with friends and loved ones—the people who’ve hurt us beyond repair; to those places where we once had love, where we could see ourselves back by the shimmering ocean, holding hands with the love of our lives, recounting each spoken word, and feeling the feeling that only that deep memory could bring. Time is where we could conjure up feelings that belong to another and pretend that those feelings are toward us. Time is fickle. It affords us our inspirations, giving us false hope, and then takes it away the second we turn our attention back to the now.

If we take away our sleep and remain awake, would we’d be able to say the words yesterday, today, or tomorrow? Time is a made up event that justifies what we can’t explain, to give us the chance of changing our paths, to give us hope that there is something to cling on to. Does a person who dreams of tomorrow exist only in today? How could he? If his attention is on what he’ll achieve then he isn’t living in the now, so he must be living in the future. But one would argue that his physical body is in the present, despite that his consciousness is somewhere else. So how do we determine time when we’re constantly exploring the past and the future?

But what if we lived in a place where every single idea we had instantly manifested as an event, and what if all these ideas and dreams were just hanging out, together at once? What if our thoughts of the past, and of today, and of tomorrow manifested at the same time and suddenly everything we ever wanted and dreamed of, the good and the bad, happened right before our eyes, just waiting for us to choose which we’ll focus on first? What if that was to happen?

Time is the place that feeds our dreams. It’s the place where we venture back, recalling moments of loved ones lost, of the laughter and joy that their precious attachment gave us. It’s a place where nobody else but you can go. Nobody can take it away from us. The young are naïve; they think of time as never ending, until time creeps up on them and makes them frightfully aware that their time is about to end. It gives the young girl visions and thrills and gives the old woman the fear of what the next day brings. Time is an enigma, elusive and unforgettable, yet tangible and scary, something we think about every second of our lives.

When will you come visit me? the mother says to her grown child. The ‘when’ is the heartbreak. It’s the thought that maybe it won’t come to pass. When will I get that raise or when will I find love? The when is the part of the equation that we fear the most, yet hold on to for dear life. It’s the ‘when’ that we live for, that we aspire to, that we won’t ever let go of.

Time makes lovers laugh, the aged cry, the hopeless beg, and the unloved wishing for just one moment of happiness. It’s a ghost of our fears and the comfort of our dreams, fleeting endlessly, to get us to create more.